


Sub Stella

by Ericine



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: Camping, F/F, Fluff, Gen, Pre-Femslash, Stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-20 22:02:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4803830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ericine/pseuds/Ericine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabrielle's first night sleeping outdoors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sub Stella

**Author's Note:**

> A birthday present for a dear friend! Also because I'm in the middle of season 5 right now and feeling like I need a reprieve from the angst. :/

“We, um, sleep outside?”

Xena doesn’t even look up from her regular nightly preparations—she’s already actively trying to adjust for the presence of another person by the campfire. “What did you think these bedrolls were for?”

“Extra—I don’t know. For Argo?”

Xena tries to remember that she’s talking to a younger village girl. “Argo’s a horse. She doesn’t need a blanket.”

“Horses have stables.”

“Not by choice,” says Xena. For not the first time, Argo makes what Gabrielle swears is a sound of agreement.

Gabrielle tries to pick her next words carefully. She doesn’t want Xena to think that she’s incapable. That would undo everything she’s already done to get this far. “And um, what if it rains?”

Xena tries to predict the distance Gabrielle would like to sleep away from the fire and surreptitiously places an extra blanket on her side. It’s a relatively warm night. She won’t need the blanket, and it’ll put some extra space between Gabrielle and the ground. “Then we try and find shelter, leave early if we need to. There’s pretty good tree coverage here.” She’d stopped a little earlier than usual, figuring it would take a little longer to ready for the night. She wasn’t sure how long, though. The tree cover probably wasn’t the best spot security-wise, but this particular type of wood was good at repelling insects.

“And if it’s cold?”

“Then we find an inn, but it’s not cold, and sleeping outside is fine. It’s perfectly safe.” Realizing this conversation’s gone on a little too long, Xena turns around. “You are alright with this, right? We can—”

“No, I’m not going back,” says Gabrielle, more firmly than she intends. Xena doesn’t look as surprised as she feels, though. “I can sleep out here. I just—um, you know, haven’t done it before. That’s why I’m asking questions.”

Xena nods. “Asking questions is good sometimes.”

“Is this one of the sometimes?”

“Yes.” Finished with Gabrielle’s roll (she’ll teach her how to do it later, if Gabrielle stays, and Xena thinks that she probably will), she crawls back to her side of the campfire, looking the perimeter of the circle over one last time for anything she may have missed. “You’ve never slept outside before?”

Gabrielle walks over to her new bed and sits down gingerly, testing the material with her hands. “My sister and I decided to pretend we were adventurers when we were younger,” she says. “We were outside then. Our mother let us use one of the sheets and a clothesline to build a really terrible fort. She must have had to wash it twice to get all of the dirt out because we kept pulling it off and pretending to be spirits.” Gabrielle laughs. She always lights up when she’s telling a story, Xena notices. “I remember being surprised that she let us do it at all—we had to keep quiet, though, or our giggling would have woken up the whole village. Did you, um, do anything like that when you were younger?”

“Not really,” says Xena shortly.

Gabrielle nods, a little nervous again. “We didn’t really stay out all night, you know. It was dark for a little while, and we decided that we would rather go back inside. I think maybe our parents knew that we were going to do that, because when we went inside, there was mint in our room. It was fresh, like something extra for us. Or maybe they knew that we would smell like the dirt.”

Xena chuckles. “Well, there are a few perks to sleeping outside.”

“Like what?”

Xena subdues the fire—just enough to keep them warm and to keep animals away. Gabrielle’s eyes still dart around them when it gets a little darker, but she doesn’t say anything. “Look up.”

Granted, “up” is mostly trees and hardly anything too fantastic, but Gabrielle gasps when she sees the sprinkling of stars among the branches. “Gods.”

“They’re always better out here, even better than a village in the middle of the night. I think it’s something about being alone.”

Gabrielle turns to her. “Sorry I had to tag along.”

“Not what I meant.”

Gabrielle laughs and lies back, going back to the stars. “You don’t have to be polite.”

“I mean, it’s nice to talk about it with someone. You know what I mean,” Xena says, when Argo makes a sound of protest. She lies down and rolls over.

“Xena?”

“Yep?”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“I just feel like this is the beginning of a really fantastic— _something_ , you know?”

“I don’t.”

“I know some really cool stories about these stars. Like this one constellation—”

“Gabrielle.”

“Sorry.” She’s silent after that, and yet Xena somehow _feels_ that she wants to talk more even though her back is turned. She sighs. “Gabrielle?”

Gabrielle perks back up. “Yes?”

“One story. _One_ , okay?”

She hears a thump that sounds like Gabrielle stomping enthusiastically. “Yes!”

“You can tell me another one tomorrow, another one the next d—”

"Story every night?"

"We'll see."

She doesn’t see Gabrielle’s smile, but she feels it.


End file.
